


Are You in Love with Him?

by nerdhourariel



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: F/M, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Kylo Ren Redemption, Post-Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Reylo - Freeform, The Force Ships It
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-17
Updated: 2018-03-17
Packaged: 2019-04-03 20:57:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,422
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14004615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nerdhourariel/pseuds/nerdhourariel
Summary: After Ben defects and the First Order falls, things aren't as easily forgiven and forgotten and he must face a trial to determine his future. Rey is put on the stand as a character witness amidst growing feelings and complicated force bond emotions.





	Are You in Love with Him?

I basically wrote this in one sleep deprived sitting but I thought what the Hell lets post it. It's unbeta'd and my first foray into Reylo, also things are probably out of character and that's on me, but hey here we are. Please enjoy what I'm sure is a mess.

 

* * *

 

 

Flames and destruction swarm over the lush green of Naboo as the First Order TIE fighters and Rebel X-Wings lie in mutually assured destruction. It’s fitting, she thinks, that they would meet for a final time on a green planet just like the one where they met the first time. That their rage, pain, anger and loneliness would end here, that instead of a throne room burning or a cold base breaking apart, it would be this place of sanctuary, of history.

 

It doesn’t go the way she expects it to. In the end, he turns, as she always believed he could, in the end, he slays his Knights, burns down the First Order, kills his General.

 

When it’s over he falls onto his knees and waits, without a word to her.

 

She realizes, it’s the first time she’s laid eyes on him in person since…

 

He looks tired.

 

Much more tired than he’s ever looked when he’s appeared in her head. He’s pale, his scar almost more prominent on his face, his eyes bleary and red from lack of sleep. She swallows a thick lump in her throat, her heart betraying her as her feelings flow across the bond.

 

As the Resistance descends, as they place him in chains as his mother watches, she thinks she sees him falter in whatever determination he has. His bound hands clench and unclench before him, but he keeps his eyes forward as Poe brings him to his feet, leading him towards whatever cell they have.

 

She’s lying when she tells herself she feels nothing as she watches it all unfold. As his silence cuts her more than any words or punches they’ve thrown.

 

Six months since Crait and the bond has been as much a burden as a point of harbor for the both of them in the loneliest hours on opposite sides of a war.

 

She ignores him for the first month, focuses on fixing the lightsaber that once belonged to his Uncle but now belongs to her. He appears and she holds her breath until the pop in her ears tells her he’s gone.

 

But then it starts to feel more like she’s holding her breath until he comes back and she knows she’s going to have to talk to him sooner rather than later.

 

It’s late and she’s tired the next time he appears, plans are coming together and failing and she doesn’t feel much like the Jedi or the Hope the Resistance wants her to be. The muffled telltale sound of his arrival and the shadow of the Supreme Leader behind her are the rocks that shatter the glass house surrounding her anger.

 

Anger at him, at the situation, at the war, it all comes crumbling down and burns him on the spot.

 

“Why won’t you just stay away?” Rey asks, her voice even despite the storm brewing inside of her.

 

“Are we talking now?” He asks, his voice too quiet, shaky, hoarse. Afraid. She realizes.

 

She turns to him, to see him, really see him in his new role but all she sees is the scared boy, Ben Solo hiding behind Supreme Leader, Kylo Ren.

 

“Snoke lied, you know,” Ben says, his hands held to his sides, like he’s still frozen in place. “About the Bond. It would have died with him if…”

 

“Why do you care?” She asks, her voice rising. She knows she’s going to start yelling soon, that someone will hear her. The base in the Outer Rim they’re hiding on is small, the shifts changing every four hours, someone will walk by her quarters.

 

She finds she doesn’t care if they catch her yelling at a ghost.

 

“Because I thought you would,” he answers, his eyes staring into her, tearing her apart.

 

“That’s funny coming from you, like you care what I think.” She can’t fight the sting of tears that start to fall as she remembers a hand, a burning room and her heart breaking.

 

“I do,” he argues and then she really is yelling, her anger taking over, the pain overloading the bond.

 

“Then why didn’t you come with me?!”

 

He stumbles backwards as if he’s been struck, as if she’s torn another scar across his face with her saber. He takes a breath and recovers and she feels his own rage, his own pain as he shouts, “Why didn’t you stay?!”

 

“You’re a coward, Ben Solo.”

 

And then he’s gone and she’s left alone once again, holding her breath until he appears again.

 

Finn asks her if she’s okay, Poe asks her, Rose asks her, but she doesn’t know how to respond, how to explain it all.

 

Leia doesn’t ask. Leia knows she isn’t, knows about the Bond before Rey even tells her.

 

For all his efforts to ignore her words, Ben continues to shape the galaxy for her, to become the Supreme Leader his grandfather could never be, to do something worthwhile and kill the past to bring about something better.

 

He’s haunted by the ghost of his father’s hand on his face as he dies, his uncle and salt that turned blood red, and Rey.

 

He’s haunted by her words most of all because she’s the one who can find his weakness without a second glance, who can cut to the truth of him without pomp and circumstance.

 

He is a coward, hiding behind another mask, hiding behind a moniker because it’s easy, because a part of him wants so desperately to be right even though he knows he isn’t. He devoted half his life to Snoke, to this crusade, what is he without it?

 

The uncertainty is scarier than the truth, than the light that still calls to him, than the thought of Rey killing him in a final conflict.

 

Maybe he’d rather die as the Supreme Leader than face those that he’s hurt with his actions. Maybe that would be the easier thing.

 

Easy is a cowards best friend and he is a coward after all.

 

She appears while he’s in a meeting with his council, Hux sneering at plans and failed recon missions to locate the Resistance.

 

Ben holds his breath behind his stoic expression, he doesn’t need to ask, he knows she can see them, can see his surroundings by the blink of her eyes and the shock flowing through the bond.

 

It’s getting stronger.

 

She disappears a moment later but not before sparing Hux a second glance, practically sneering at him.

 

Ben fights a smile and walks out of the meeting without another word to his Council only to find himself standing in the hallway of a Resistance base running to catch up to her.

 

“Are you going to yell at me again or can we have a civil conversation?” He asks as he falls into step with her, his long stride slowing to keep pace.

 

“You know meditation might help focus your abilities, allow you to better control the bond.”

 

She keeps her eyes forward, ignoring him, and he finds he can’t retreat to the background again, waiting to disappear in the static of radio silence.

 

“So we’re back to this? Pretending the other doesn’t exist when we both know this is only getting stronger? You want to call me a coward again? That seemed to make you feel better.”  He watches her jaw clench and he knows he’s winning, “You might as well talk to me, I’m only going to keep going. Where does that hallway go? Who’s that guy? What is the Resistance planning?”

 

“Shut-up, Ben,” Rey finally snaps and before she can help herself, she punches him square in his nose. She doubles back, his face solid beneath her fist, her hand practically burning from the touch as it did those lonely months ago before a fire. Her jaw hangs open as she struggles to find an apology beneath the feeling of him deserving it.

 

He smirks despite the blinding pain spreading through his face, making his eyes water. He’d laugh at the face of the Resistance fighter jogging by if he weren’t so busy wiping at the blood leaking from his nose.

 

“There she is,” Ben says, satisfied, his smirk turning into a full-fledged smile, his eyes still watering over, his nose still bleeding, “I was worried you weren’t in there.”

 

“Don’t,” Rey starts, running a hand over her face.

 

“What?” He shrugs and maybe getting punched in the nose shouldn’t make him feel better, shouldn’t make him feel more like himself than he has in years, but it does.

 

He practically relishes in it, glows with the feeling of it.

 

“Don’t smile. Act like this is normal. Be Ben when you’re nothing more than some ghost that follows me around.”

 

“I am Ben.” He swallows thickly, realizing this is the first time he’s said his own name in years, the first time he’s acknowledged that the boy he once was is still inside, that Ben Solo isn’t dead.

 

“And you’re also Supreme Leader Kylo Ren.”

 

“And you’re Rey and The Last Jedi.”

 

“And No One,” She finishes, “But not to you, right?” Her voice lowers, throwing his own words back at him.

 

“I didn’t mean it to sound…”

 

“Like what? A manipulation?”

 

“It wasn’t. It was the truth.” He forgets wiping at his nose, letting the last bit of blood flow freely, it’ll stop soon enough. “And by the way, it’s possible to be more than one thing at one time. It’s not like people are simple creatures.”

 

“Is it?” She asks, staring into his eyes, searching. He feels the push of her through the bond, digging around for the truth, if he means what he’s saying. “Because the way I see it, you can’t be Supreme Leader and then follow me through this bond and smile like nothing is happening out there.”

 

He falls silent. The truth in her words once again sends his thoughts, his heart, in a million directions. He closes himself off to her, silencing his feelings through the bond, he doesn’t have a response.

 

“Why are you still there?” She asks in a voice barely above a whisper. Her hand reaches out and then draws back as she takes in his tired eyes, his sagging shoulders, the bloody nose she gave him. “It’s going to kill you. General Hux is going to kill you.”

 

Ben’s eyes follow her hand, his own clenching, desperate to reach out and hold it from a galaxy away. But it’s not enough, it’ll never be enough, she deserves more than this, more than him.

 

He feels the pull as the bond starts to close, but before he goes he leaves her with the words, “He should.”

 

Rey grows closer with Poe as months wear on. The pilot is kind, understanding of her Jedi status in a way that not many others are, where at first he was in awe of her, he treats her like everyone else, with maybe a slight more kindness than he offers certain others.  She flies the Falcon and he flies beside her, they fight and win or fight and retreat. She finds herself smiling more around him, forgetting the burdens she bears. It feels good, normal despite everything.

 

Ben appears to her one night when neither one of them can sleep. She lies in her bed until he ears pop and she hears him pacing before she sees him doing so. His hands are clasped behind his back, his hair in disarray.

 

“Ben,” she says and he stops. “Lie down.”

 

She slides over and he awkwardly squeezes in beside her. They sit in silence as his too large body occupies more than half of her small cot, despite her best efforts there’s no avoiding contact and his arm finds its way around her as she shifts so her back is flush against his chest and his other arm secures her in place, his warmth surrounding her.

 

They talk about their lives as children. Ben tells her about Coruscant, she tells him about Jakku. They don’t leave anything out. She tells him about scars from scavenging. He tells her about Snoke in his head.

 

Neither one admits that there’s something about the conversation and holding each other that heals in a way no Bacta tank could.

 

“Do you love him?” Ben asks in the darkness. He’s seen her with Poe, seen her smile, seen her laugh. He hates it. He hates him and hates himself most of all for wanting to kill him while wishing he could just disappear and let her be happy with him.

 

“I don’t know. I could.” And she’s not lying but there’s a part of her that is, that feels guilty about all of this. Her days are spent laughing with Poe, fixing ships, or talking about things that aren’t the war when they don’t have a mission to plan but her nights are occupied with the ghost in her head, connected to her very soul in a way no one else will understand.

 

“Does he know I’m in your head? Do any of them?”

 

“Your mother knows.”

 

He stays silent but she hears his whispered thought, ‘good.’

 

The Resistance finds shelter on Naboo and the First Order descends about a week later. Rey blames herself, blames the bond, blames the weakness in her heart but fights like Hell for whatever will be left after all of this.

 

And then the Resistance wins and Kylo Ren falls to his knees in surrender in front of a burning war zone and the bodies of the Knights of Ren.

 

The celebrations last weeks and when they end, the trial is set to begin.

 

He doesn’t talk to her through the bond. Finn volunteers to guard him after Rey tells him about the bond. She knows he doesn’t need to, knows better than anyone how hard it is for him to do, but he brings Ben his food and reports back to Rey whether or not he’s eating.

 

“You should tell Poe,” Finn says to her one afternoon and she nods. “The guy’s in love with you Rey and he deserves to know.”

 

“They’re going to kill him, Finn. It’ll be gone soon.”

 

“Will it?” He asks and she huffs as she wipes tears away before they can fall. She’s read up on force bonds, knows that his death will steal something from her, that there will be this empty space where he should be and it will be a wound that will never heal quite right.

 

She takes her leave and walks nowhere in particular. There isn’t a war to fight, she doesn’t know what to do with her days when she isn’t helping clean up the mess left behind after the battle.

 

“I can’t believe they let him live,” Rey hears someone say and she stops to see a small group of Resistance fighters passing around a flask, a few of them swaying already.

 

“Not for long. They’ll probably make a public execution of it, you know, really end the war with a grand finale,” a drunken Resistance fighter practically yells to his friends beside him, “And then it won’t matter that he’s the General’s son. Good riddance and long live the Supreme Leader.” The man toasts before the steel flask bends and flies from his hand, the alcohol spilling over him.

 

Rey runs before they can see her, before they can accuse her and she hears Ben through the bond for the first time since he arrived.

 

“Did the truth upset you, young Jedi?”

 

“Shut-up.” She can feel the smirk radiating through his voice and she rolls her eyes.

 

“So I deserve to live after what I’ve done? You would have let me live if I hadn’t…”

 

“You turned, Ben, you stopped it.” His smirk fades, the humor gone in an instant.

 

“Would you have let me live?” He asks again, insistent, “If I had my mother beneath my saber, if I had Finn, or Poe, if I had a Death Star aimed on the planet, would you have let me live?”

 

“You didn’t.”

 

“That doesn’t answer the question,” he says, his voice filled with a self-loathing she’s come to recognize as a part of whatever absolution he seeks mixed with the loneliness she knows as an echo of her own.

 

“Because I don’t know the answer!” She yells to no one and then she’s alone in her head again. But she knows, if she reaches out, if she follows the string that ties them together she can talk to him whenever she wants through the bond.

 

It’s too strong now. Stronger despite no effort put into making it so, strong enough that she knows if she saw him in person, saw him solid and real, visited him in his cell, there would be no going back.

 

If he dies, she’s afraid she would die too.

 

“You’ve been quiet since he got here,” Poe tells her early one evening. They’re on their first real date, one he promised if they both survived the war, and she had been far too eager to accept but now finds herself lost in her head, in Ben’s, in her worries of what tomorrow will bring.

 

The trial. His crimes brought before a council that his mother isn’t on. An execution that is sure to come.

 

“Rey,” Poe says and she blinks, focusing on him. The stars shine brightly on Naboo. They’re sitting outside, sharing food that didn’t come from a Resistance base, and she hasn’t touched a bite of it, hasn’t smiled once.

 

“I’m sorry,” she offers and Poe shakes his head.

 

“Why are you apologizing?”

 

“I don’t know.” She swallows, “I have to tell you something about me and Ben.”

 

His eyebrows raise after she says this but he listens, never interrupting, nodding along as she tells him about the bond. She notices the slight hurt in his eyes, notices him try to cover it up, but then he stops trying and is as honest as he’s always been.

 

“So what you’re telling me is this guy and you basically share a brain? Well that certainly does complicate my intentions but look, I don’t pretend to understand the Force or the Jedi stuff, but I can try.”

 

He smiles and she shrugs and somehow it makes her feel better, relieved even that he isn’t calling her a traitor or just as monstrous as him.

 

“I don’t want to make you try with me. I want you to…”

 

“What?”

 

“I don’t know,” she says for the second time since they sat down and he sighs.

 

“That’s what I was worried about,” he tells her, “It’s more complicated than just sharing a brain isn’t it? You love him.”

 

She blinks and shakes her head because she doesn’t know that she does, doesn’t know that she could, and she half expects to see some kind of disgust on Poe’s face but it isn’t there, just a solemn understanding.

“I’m not. I don’t. He’s…it’s…”

 

“Complicated?” Poe offers and Rey falls back in her seat, crossing her arms over her chest.

 

“The guy tortured me and now the woman I…she loves him…and she’s lying to herself about it and yet somehow I can’t find it in myself to hate the guy.”

 

“Why not?” Rey asks, because he should, because she should, this shouldn’t be like this, it shouldn’t be complicated, it should be simple, “He’s the bad guy, right?”

 

“He is, was, and I’m not just forgetting that but…we talk a big game but I don’t know that we would have won without him. We didn’t have the numbers, the equipment and even the last Jedi wouldn’t have been enough. When the First Order came, the formations they were off, it was like some of the ships were ordered to flank in obvious, easily attacked places, they were spaced apart just right, like he was setting us up to take them down. He helped us win and then he surrendered and that means something.” Poe takes a sip of his drink and eats a forkful of food off his plate. “Are you eating or should I just ask to take it to go?”

 

“What?”

 

“I’m not the type of guy that’s going to sit and sulk, I might drink it off for a few days but I move forward, something you should think about.” He gives her a look and takes a long drink from his glass before ordering another. Whatever message he’s trying to imply is lost on her and he soon finds Finn and Rose near the bar and joins them as she heads back to base.

 

Rey is called to Leia’s quarters after she returns. When she enters she doesn’t expect to see Ben standing there, staring at the ground. For a moment she thinks it’s just the bond but the sound isn’t muffled and there’s something more solid and real about seeing him in person. She glances between him and Leia.

 

“It’s okay, he has a tracker.” Leia points to a couch for Rey to sit, but she remains standing where she is.

 

“What is this?” Rey asks, unable to tear her eyes away from Ben for more than thirty second intervals. “Why is he here?”

 

“Last night of supposed freedom, amends to make, that whole thing,” Ben finally speaks his voice just as solid as he is, it threatens to knock Rey over, but she stands strong, tall in the face of him.

 

Leia holds up a hand and Ben retreats to stare out the window overlooking the gardens. The base, the palace really, has views from almost every corner, but Leia’s has the view Rey likes the most. There were times when she would come to this room just to sit in silence and watch the view, times where she counted flowers to take her mind off of the war, of failures and regret.

 

“I see why you would visit here, it’s peaceful,” Ben’s voice echoes through her head, Rey stares at his back, remembering moments where she felt him standing there, the silence a cavern between them as she stared at the garden and not at him.

 

Leia watches Rey and points once again to the couch and says, “It’s been a long day,” and this time Rey complies.

 

She sits for about a minute and finds herself jumping up again when Leia asks her to testify on Ben’s behalf. A character witness, someone who objective, from a Jedi’s perspective, can attest to a path of redemption, one deserving of life and not death.

 

She feels Ben tense through the bond as she tells his mother, “I can’t do that. I don’t know how.”

 

“Just be honest, tell them the truth.”

 

“What is the truth? Do I tell them that we have this connection? That because of it there’s a very good chance he saw some Resistance plans and chose not to act on them and that suddenly makes him a good person? Do I tell them that yes he killed his father, yes he tried to kill us all on multiple occasions, committed murder, torture, but he killed Snoke so that suddenly erases that?”

 

“No,” Ben answers before Leia can speak and he turns away from the window.

 

“Ben, hush,” Leia starts before turning to Rey, “I’m not asking you to say it erases that, but does that mean he needs to be executed? Does that mean death should pay for death? What does that make us if we say kill all of our enemies even the ones who help us?”

 

“Why don’t you tell them that?” Rey asks.

 

“Because I’m not allowed to be a part of it. It’s a conflict of interest.”

 

“And I’m not?”

 

“Please,” Leia says but Ben interrupts.

 

“I brought this on myself, I’ll deal with it myself, I’ll explain my actions, explain why and whatever they decide they decide. I have to face the consequences.”

 

Rey remembers calling him a coward. He is far from that now. His face shines, his eyes are brighter like whatever demons he carried have fallen into some silence. She searches her own soul and finds some of her own have been put to rest, the abandonment, the desert, it’s made her who she is and she can feel the pain of it, but has found the peace there beneath.

 

They’re not the same people who met on Starkiller, they’re not the same ones who fought together and then broke each other’s hearts in the throne room, they’re something different, something better.

 

And the vision she saw of his future, their future, swims back to the forefront of her mind, escaping the place she buried it. Move forward, Poe had told her and maybe they can.

 

“I’ll do it. I’ll speak on your behalf.” She watches Ben as he sighs half in relief and half in regret.

 

Leia is all relief as she hugs Rey and then promises she’ll return with tea as she leaves rather suspiciously after that.

 

“Doesn’t she have someone to bring her her tea?” Rey asks as the door closes behind the General with a hiss.

 

“She’s trying to give us a moment alone, in person, she could make it less obvious but well she likes to make it obvious,” Ben states with a shrug and a half smile. It’s like years have melted away from him and the broken boy has put himself back together, shining brightly for all to see. She’s stunned by it, afraid to look too closely for the cracks she knows are still there but are holding together.

 

“I guess being imprisoned is treating you well?” Rey asks, making her way towards the window, unable to keep away from the view as the sun sets behind it. Ben stands beside her and with the two of them so close she feels the bond hum, content and strong.

 

“I’ve been speaking with my uncle…and my father.” His jaw twitches as his hands clench and unclench, “Amends are rough but I need to make them. And not just to the dead.” His hands flex once again and Rey finds herself grasping one of them in her own. The warmth of his fingers clasped around her a comfort, an anchor as her heart races in anticipation of the trial.

 

He holds his breath.

 

“I don’t want to be alone when this is over.”

 

“You won’t be.”

 

“You don’t have to save me, Rey,” Ben whispers.

 

“This wouldn’t be the first time.” She smirks and his mouth curves into a smile.

 

“If it doesn’t go the way…if they decide…”

 

“Ben, shut-up and enjoy the view.” He swallows his words and looks out the window, her hand firmly in his.

 

A crowd gathers outside the meeting room where the trial is to take place. Ben walks through them and takes the barbs they throw as best he can.

 

Rey follows soon after and the quiet murmur of admiration follows her. If only they knew why she was here, if only they knew she was going to help their supposed enemy.

 

The trial begins, the special counsel comprised of commanding officers and Senators list the crimes of Kylo Ren and then decree they will only sentence him to death by unanimous vote. Their faces say that won’t be much of a challenge.

 

There are only a few in attendance of the trial, tables and chairs are on a slightly raised platform where the Counsel sits. The people watching sit in rows of chairs behind Ben who is positioned near the center of the room for all eyes to be on him with two guards at his side.

Leia is present in the small audience, along with Finn, Poe, and Rose who offer Rey hidden thumbs up in support as she takes a seat in the chair nearest the front Ben.

 

Ben doesn’t do himself any favors right off the bat. He demands they remove the destruction of the Hosnian System from his accusations. “It was Hux’s weapon and his plan. I was not involved in the creation of Starkiller.”

 

“But you benefitted from it, didn’t you? You lived there. You operated there. You didn’t stop it.”

 

“How could I have stopped it?” Ben asks.

 

“Ben, don’t get angry…” Rey offers through the bond and he takes a steadying breath.

 

“I stopped the First Order. I stopped Snoke. I did what was right in the end.”

 

“But you could have done what was right, sooner.”

 

The High Counselor calls to the few in attendance, “Is there anyone who wishes to speak on behalf of the accused?”

 

Rey stands and the counsel sits up a little straighter as she moves to stand before them.

 

“Proceed.”

 

The silence is deafening as Rey struggles to form her words.

 

“Just tell the truth,” Ben’s voice whispers through the bond and she does.

 

“Kylo Ren is dead, but Ben Solo isn’t and Ben Solo saved us.” She starts practically, starts with Snoke, Ben killed him, Ben saved her from him. Then she goes into the First Order fleet, something Poe pointed out how Ben put them in perfect positions to be destroyed by a smaller band of Resistance fighters. She talks about Hux, about what a cruel man he was and brings up the weapon he built and poses Ben’s question to them, ‘how could he have stopped it when we almost failed to stop it?’

 

She doesn’t quite know how to address the death of Han Solo, but she knows that he wouldn’t want them to kill his son over it.

 

She can feel the pragmatism not working, the harsh eyes ready to make an example of the former Kylo Ren.

 

“You might have to get a little mystical with it, they’ll be too confused to convict,” Luke’s voice calls through the force and Rey straightens at the sound. “What you think I’d miss this?”

 

“Ben said he’d been talking to you, I wondered…” She thinks and he finishes the thought for her.

 

“Why I hadn’t spoken to you? He and I had a lot more unfinished business to get to. It took a little longer than expected. Now please, spare me from having to deal with him in the afterlife and keep him alive.

 

Rey smiles and then does as her once sort of Master says and gets mystical. She talks about the force, how she’s had visions, has visions, that Ben’s got a lot more to do to keep the future bright and shiny, how the light and the dark swirl in him but he’s found a balance and balance in the force is important.

 

In the end the high counselor has one question for her. “And how long have you been in love with him?”

 

Rey freezes. Out of all the questions she could have expected, that was not one of them. She stays quiet, too afraid to look anywhere but at the High Counselor’s face. The woman has a pointed nose, her bone structure all angles and harsh lines, exactly the type of person who would be High Counselor.

 

Rey would wither beneath the woman’s scrutinizing gaze if it weren’t for the sheer terror of her heart threatening to betray her and sentence Ben to die.

 

“Answer the question, please. How long have you been in love with Ben Solo?”

 

“I’m…”

 

“Let me rephrase, you chose to save him, you chose to step aboard the Finalizer, go into enemy territory for him, you fought beside him and you say he killed his former Master for you. Your defense of him is based on visions and feelings, something we can’t confirm and yet you seem so certain of. If you had a choice between him at your side or a blaster at your side which would you choose?”

 

“I don’t understand how that’s relevant,” Rey argues.

 

“Which would you choose?”

 

“Him,” Rey answers.

 

“You would choose him over an object with no thoughts and feelings, one that could not betray you, that wasn’t a war criminal, you would choose him. And why is that?”

 

Rey bites her tongue.

“I’ll ask you again, do you love him? Do you love him?!”

 

“Enough!” Ben stands as the chair beneath him shatters. Two guards turn their blasters towards him.

 

“You will sit back down!” The High Counselor points to him, rising from her own chair.

 

“In what chair?” He sneers, “She testified, leave her alone.”

 

“Yes,” Rey admits to the room and it all falls silent again. She still doesn’t look at Ben but she can feel him still in the force.

 

“Repeat that?” The High Counselor asks, her eyes widening as she slowly descends back into her own seat.

 

“A good friend of mine told another good friend of mine when she saved his life that we don’t win by fighting what he hate, we win by saving what we love.”

 

“I said that,” she briefly hears Rose whisper to Finn.

 

“I know, I was there,” Finn answers back.

 

“Quiet please,” The High Counselor states and Finn and Rose sink in their seat, Rey fights a smile as she turns back to face the High Counselor, refusing to turn to the side and look at Ben, refusing to see his eyes bearing into her as she speaks.

 

“I love him. And I think that makes him worth saving. I know saying sorry doesn’t mean anything when people are dead, but actions mean something. He helped save us and it wasn’t out of self-preservation, it was out of love.”

 

“You think he loves you?”

 

“It doesn’t matter if he loves me. He loves his mother, our General, he saved her life by ending the war. And if you can’t see that, if you want to kill him because you can’t get the other monsters, which by the way he took care of a good few of them, then you’ll be just as bad as them.” Rey breathes, crossing her arms over her chest. “Any more questions?”

 

Ben is brought back to his cell minutes later as trial closes and everyone but the Counsel is forced to leave. Rey sits outside the closed room, her back against the wall and feels the tell tale pop of the bond springing to life. She sees Ben across from her, sitting much the same way, his eyes closed.

 

“This could be our last conversation,” he states, his eyes still closed.

 

“Are you controlling it now?” She asks, her voice shaky.

 

“I told you, if you meditated and focused on honing your force abilities you could learn to control it too.” It’s then that he opens his eyes to meet hers and she finds herself drowning in the warmth of them.

 

“Did you mean it?” He asks and Rey tears herself from his gaze.

 

“Why are you asking when you know the truth?”

 

“Because I like to hear you say it.” She looks back at him and watches the smile crack over his face. “And I could be dead in a few hours, so I’d like to hear it again.”

 

“I meant what I said, I love you, Ben.”

 

“And I love my mother,” he states and Rey smacks her head against the wall behind her as she leans back.

 

“That’s not…they and you knew what I meant. I couldn’t very well say you love me when I don’t know that…”

 

“I do.”

 

She picks her head up and looks at him, across the expanse, half of his cell melding perfectly with half of her hallway and she wishes her were there for real, wishes she could cross over to him or he to her.

 

He wishes a lot of things.

 

“I love you.”

 

And with that the door opens and he disappears. Rey stands finding the High Counselor and the Counsel itself departing. She stares at the angled woman and holds her breath.

 

“Somehow I knew you’d be waiting. You’ll be relieved to hear that there will be no execution. Given his actions, Ben Solo is to be released…under the watchful protection of the Last Jedi. I hope you were right.” The High Counselor smiles and leaves as Rey remains behind in the hallway, rooted to the spot, mouth dry, heart pounding.

He’ll live. She saved him. And now she’s stuck with him.

 

The people outside aren’t too happy with the decision and she knows Ben has a long way to go to win them over, but it’ll happen, she has hope.

 

“Should we celebrate? Do we celebrate? What’s the precedent for this?” Poe asks as they wait outside for Ben. Finn shrugs.

 

“I think yes we celebrate,” Rose says with a firm nod. “If you’re legally supposed to be around him does that mean you two are basically married?” She asks Rey who shakes her head.

 

“I mean the force kind of married them already, now it’s just legal,” Finn offers with a smile. Rey rolls her eyes.

 

“You know what, why don’t you three go on ahead and I’ll wait here,” the way she says it leaves no room for argument and Rose leads the boys away before the doors open and Ben walks out. He blinks in the sunlight as he runs a hand through his hair. He’s wearing fresh clothes, a white shirt, black pants; they look almost like his father’s. The only thing missing is the vest.

 

“So where to, Warden?” He asks with a smirk but Rey doesn’t have a response, she stops him midway down the steps and leans forward, pressing her lips to his. Her head swims as her hands lace around his neck as he returns the kiss only for her to break it off a moment later. He licks his lips after and her mouth dries at the sight. Oh she would want more of that in the future.

 

The future. It's vast and open and there for them to take. On Jakku she didn't think much past living until the next day, as Kylo Ren he cared more about the past. Now they had a future, a chance, hope.

 

“Don’t call me, Warden,” she says, poking him in the chest.

 

“I’ll think of something better, eventually.”

 

They descend the steps, side by side, towards the future.


End file.
